We are all a product of our past generations and without knowing who they were, how can we truly know who we are? If you want to get to know yourself better, contact me to get started! In this blog, you can find tips on doing genealogy research along with stories of drama, mystery, and intrigue (oh and humor too). So, get some popcorn, your favorite drink and settle in while we take a path of discovery. Consider yourself a detective trying to solve the age old question - WHO AM I?

Wednesday, November 09, 2011

What part am I??

I was thinking about the Math part from my previous blog, Math & Genealogy - it does a family good, and hoping I didn't put anyone off, even though it is amazing. Still, I am going to risk it one more time... with some more math - fractions. YEAAAHHHH!

Considering many people always want to know "where they came from", I hope I can help you answer this question. This fundamentally means we want to be able to trace back our roots to some geographic location and/or ethnologically unique place in time, and literally, you can do this in a few simple ways.

First, you can start filling in the blanks of your family tree, by digging into history of your past, with as much as you know, and/or talking with your relatives.

Second, you can have a Genealogist (like me), do a family tree for you (if interested, contact me).

Lastly, you can get a DNA test, and see where your genes really started, going back thousands of years. I can tell that a DNA test is going to really tell you details that your great Aunt Ninnie can not!

So, once you have the family tree, we just need to know the country your ancestors were born in and what generation they came from. To keep this simple, I am going to demonstrate how this works for only 3 generations, to my great-grandparents. Mine is actually very easy, at least to identify, since in the last 3 generations, I have only 1 great-grandparent who was born in another country, Germany. To figure out what fraction of German I am, I simply use the 2^n formula for the generation. When I do this, I get 1/2^3 or 1/8 German. That's it... I am 7/8's American and 1/8 German - WOW! That explains why I can only speak German 1/8 as good as English ;(

Its easier to see the math in action, if you look at the table below. GGMa is German.

Gen

Tot

%

Me

0

1

Me

Parents

1

2

0

Pa

Ma

G Parents

2

4

0

G Pa

G Ma

G Pa

G Ma

G G Parents

3

8

1/8

GG Pa

GG Ma

GG Pa

GG Ma

GG Pa

GG Ma

GG Pa

GG Ma

One condition I would apply is that in order to consider your "origin" and therefore, your paternal birth countries, you should at a minimum, expect the family to be living in that country for no less than 3 generations. Therefore, for me, my great-grandmother, and her parents, and her grandparents, would need to also have been born in Germany. To do this helps eliminate cases where grandparents were born in county A, then their children were born in country B, and their grandkids were born in yet another country C. It makes the fractions a bit impossible, not to mention really confusing the grandkids when you get a number greater than 100%. For example, if you do this and you get a number like 150% Swedish and 25% French, you know something didn't go right...in the number calculations!

Lets take a look at a hypothetical example, to see how easy it is. Lets say my paternal GGPa was born in Brazil and GGMa born in Peru (and have 3 generations past). In addition, lets say my maternal GMa was born in Germany, and my paternal GPa was born in the UK, we would have the following table.

Gen

Tot

%

Me

0

1

Me

Parents

1

2

0

Pa

Ma

G Parents

2

4

1/4+1/4

G Pa

G Ma

G Pa

G Ma

G G Parents

3

8

1/8+1/8

GG Pa

GG Ma

GG Pa

GG Ma

GG Pa

GG Ma

GG Pa

GG Ma

This means I would be 1/8 Peruvian, 1/8 Brazilian, 1/4 UK, and 1/4 German. Notice I didn't include the maternal GGPa/Ma? You want to count the "latest generation", in this case my maternal Gpa/Ma.

As you start looking at trees going back further, you may see that each generation gets smaller and smaller since we keep using the formula, 1/2^n. In fact, the 4th and 5th generations are just 1/16 and 1/32, respectively. Either way, we are still a fraction of those ancestors from hundreds and thousands of years ago and it is important to remember them and realize we wouldn't be here without them.

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Who Am I?

My name is Brian Sanders. I've been doing genealogy work since 1975, when I was 10 years old (you're never too young to start researching your ancestors). My ancestral roots are German, Irish, and English. My family were pioneers who settled much of the early territories / states, from Vermont, New York, Tennessee, Missouri, Illinois, Nebraska and Colorado. I can trace directly to ancestors on the Mayflower, veterans of American Revolutionary War, War of 1812, and American Civil War.

I also have 27+ years in the Computer, Semiconductor and Technology industry as an Engineer. I serve on the board of directors for the Arizona Education Scholarship Foundation and have a partnership in a software start-up company. I follow politics, enjoy outdoors, and am working on a book about the Sanders Family early settlers.

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